Saturday, December 20, 2008

Decrease Government By Demanding Anarchism?

Susan, I believe the best cure for bad information is almost always to add good information, rather than removing the bad. That practice maintains liquidity in the marketplace of ideas.

Volvoice, I don't agree that demanding zero government is the most expedient way to decrease government, any more than I believe that asking for a free car is the best way to get a deal on my next car purchase. And even if I did believe that demanding zero government were the most expedient way to decrease government, I'm not sure I could put expedience above principle in that way, because I object in principle to zero government. However, if I did believe in zero government, I would recognize that the best way to advocate it is to decrease government and let people see that things work better the less government (and more competition) there is. Surely you must believe that zero government is easier to sell in minarchotopia than under a nanny state. Instead, it seems that anarchists are afraid that anarchism will seem less appealing the closer we get to it.

As for "crickets", I already wrote three days ago: "even in the context of the current bailout mania, Redpath should indeed have included personal liberties along with economic liberties in his list of LP promises. That's why the platform is split into Personal Liberty and Economic Liberty sections: to highlight the theme that we are not Left, not Right, but Libertarian."

Melville, I didn't imply that the purpose of the poll was to determine the makeup of NatCon delegates. You can either deal with the available data, or not. Reality is not optional.

Geoffrey, the high-turnout polls you cite almost all came from right around Nov 4. I wonder what was happening around then that might drive traffic to lp.org? Of your other two examples, one was again about the POTUS horse race, and the other was on the hot-button issue of guns. Since mod-November the median poll response has been around 300, and the only two above 500 were about Bush (900) and Afghanistan (1200). So yeah, the poll in question showed evidence of exogenous shock.

Starchild, the reformers' goal is not "watering down the Libertarian Party’s message and moving it toward more acceptance of the State". The reformers' goal is to make the LP ecumenical toward the various principled schools of libertarianism. Your only hope of stopping us is to admit that's our aim and to try to argue against it. Until you do, you'll remain a bug on our windshield. :-)

As I've already told you, I'd love to see this poll re-run with votes in dollars, against a menu of LP spending priorities. Let's see LewRockwell.com try to stuff THAT ballot box.

Ecowoman, I don't doubt that there are several times more anarcholibertarians outside the LP than inside it -- just as there are many times more minarcholibertarians outside the LP than in. The big-tent goal is to get all libertarians (back) inside the tent.